


It's Demyx, Err, Halloween Time!

by kei (knittenkitten)



Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Comedy, Demyx Does A Good Thing, Demyx However Does NOT Learn A Lesson, Gen, It's my party and I'll cry if I want to, Light Riku Angst, Technically a Halloween fic!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-13 21:47:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28660437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/knittenkitten/pseuds/kei
Summary: Demyx tries to keep himself from getting benched in the future by doing a good deed.  It doesn't go exactly as planned.
Kudos: 8





	It's Demyx, Err, Halloween Time!

Demyx carefully spread the cotton batting… well; no, he wasn’t _too_ careful about it. Hard work aside, it would ruin the effect if he was, and he was having quite a bit of difficulty finding a midpoint between “blobs of cotton” and “strands everywhere, I guess."

Geez. He had tried leaving this to the water clones as he strummed his sitar and watched GummiTube Halloween how-to videos, like he had just about everything else (including _most_ of the mopping up of their footprints), but the water made the batting all frizzy and droopy. At least sending them dancing had been perfect for making the punch—and a bucket for bobbing of apples.

He sure felt silly for having grumbled about picking the right skill sets for the job all the time when he was _voluntarily_ doing something tedious like this. Still, Demyx had to admit that being benched completely had wounded his ego. Or perhaps it had evoked in him some kind of sympathy for what the rest of them had to go through... surely a fun Halloween party would make up for it! Complete with a performance of what was sure to be his hit Halloween single!

At the very least, it would make all this effort pay off for _something_.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a blonde girl wandering in and clutching a sketchbook against her chest.

"Oh, it's the artist!" Demyx said, immediately dropping the attempt at spiderwebs (which was still only a semi-passable mess).

Ignoring that he'd forgotten her name completely—what a peach!—she smiled and proudly presented her sketchbook to Demyx. "Sorry I'm late! They needed help back at the lab. It's the Naminé Halloween special!"

Nice touch with the name—Na-mi-né. She should probably try a catchphrase to make that easier to remember, just like Axley had.

The drawings he flipped through were... cute. He was looking for something less mischievous and more spooky, but he wasn't sure what he had been expecting from somebody that pint-sized.

Well, that puppet girl had been pretty creepy the first couple of days, not to mention her _actually being a puppet_. Maybe Demyx should've asked _her_ instead. Maybe she could've even pulled off a Sadako bit. That would've been pretty badass.

Wait a sec—"Late?"

"I know you wanted me to come a half-hour early, but the party's just about to start, isn't it?"

Demyx's head snapped toward the clock on the wall. "Crap! You're right!"

He shoved the bags of cotton under the sink and threw a roll of masking tape at Naminé... though it landed about 6 inches from her feet and rolled back toward the door. Whoops.

She picked it up anyway, clearly being one of those weird kids who valued hard work. "Should I tape up my drawings with this?"

"Yeah, that'd be great," Demyx replied, shuffling around the room and shoving empty bags of chips into the trash.

"OK!" Naminé began diligently, removing the first page with a careful, slow tear.

Yikes, that was gonna take some time. Why did work always take so much time? So overrated. What a bummer.

Speaking of bummers... “Man, I wonder when everybody’s gonna show up.”

"Who all did you invite?"

"All the coats," Demyx replied with a sigh. He _knew_ they hated him.

Naminé pulled out her Gummiphone, which looked comically large in her small hand, and pointed at it with her other hand. “Perhaps you could try this!”

"Oh yeah! That thing!" His "cool kids" member card and some of his old friends had one now, too. Demyx sent out a text to the groupchat, which he'd labeled “Coat Chat."

> Demyx: Hey, guys! Coming to the Halloween party at my place?

Maybe they'd just forgotten, or ignored, the invites... but the responses came flying in.

> Isa: No.
> 
> Even: What made you think I would be interested in such **NONSENSE**?

Ouch. Though he had a point.

> Marluxia: Hmph.
> 
> Larxene: As _if_.

...that _witch_ wasn't welcome, anyway. Why had he even invited her?

> Luxord: Not in the cards.
> 
> Ienzo: I’m terribly sorry, but I think we're on the cusp of something big at the lab tonight. I hope you all have fun!

_Nerd._ He always made Demyx look lazy, anyway. That'd leave out Xal- Dilan and Aeleus, too, wouldn't it?

The X-men were, of course, out of the question. And/or existence. Demyx hadn't actually bothered checking what was up with Xiggy.

“No time for Demyx, I guess…”

Naminé frowned, then started scrolling through her Gummiphone. Yeah, it was turning into _that_ kinda party, wasn't it?

Just then, Axley wandered in. “Sorry. Kinda got stuck with the _Sortas_. Thanks for the reminder!”

"Ax-Lea! ...Axley! So glad you could make it! All the other _losers_ had _better_ stuff to do. Man, they should try a vacay once in a while, you know?"

"So I saw." Lea (crap—that was his name now, wasn't it?) looked down and spotted Naminé, who had stopped scrolling through her phone and appeared to be politely contemplating whether or not to bother pulling out her next set of drawings. "Wait, you invited the _kid_ here? I thought this was one of the _fun_ parties!" he whispered— ** _loudly_** , and way too close to Demyx's ear. Rude.

"Well, I was _going_ to have her hang up the drawings, then pay her and send her back home," Demyx hissed, "but if you haven't _noticed,_ nobody else is coming, and it's kind of awkward!"

Lea and Naminé looked at him with that shiny, _sympathetic_ gaze Demyx absolutely hated getting.

"Man..." Demyx hung his head low and let his arms drop. He _knew_ he should've just spent the night alone rocking out to some spooky tunes on his sitar. But instead, he'd decided to do some work for _once_ , and it had gone completely unappreciated. Not chill, bros.

“Don't worry! I’ve got an idea!”

Naminé pulled out her Gummiphone again and showed Demyx a calendar entry.

"The Twilight Town Halloween Bash, huh?"

Naminé nodded. "They could use some music, I think! And I'll text a friend of mine who could use some cheering up, too! I bet _you_ could make him smile!"

Demyx eyed Riku's contact info as Naminé pulled it up. "Oh, so he likes music, huh?"

She just giggled. That kid seemed kinda... stiff and _lame_ , really, but maybe Naminé knew something he didn't. And he couldn't resist the opportunity to show off his new Halloween single.

"Twilight Town? C'mon, guys, I was just there!" Lea protested.

Demyx threw a Corridor of Darkness up. "And that's why we're takin' the easy way! Let's freakin' goooo!!"

And with some help from Pence—nerd supreme—and his ultimate stagehand friends, they were quickly set up to play.

"Did Riku make it?" Naminé asked Olette, who was peeking in front of the makeshift curtain she'd helped Hayner put up.

"Yes! But... where's Kairi?" Olette responded, twiddling her fingers.

Naminé put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry. She's... a little occupied, right now. But I'm sure she'll visit lots once she's done!"

"If she doesn't pull a Rip Van Winkle like that one gal in the castle did!" Demyx chuckled.

"Ignore him," Naminé hissed. She absolutely _glared_ at Demyx while Olette stared at him in shock. Sheesh! Demyx noted to watch out for her hidden temper.

Whatever. It was time to go!

He summoned his sitar and winked at Lea, and out they came to a small, cheering crowd.

"It's **Demyx Time**!" he yelled into the microphone, and then he set off on a sweet sitar riff. Completely necessary. Completely badass.

Satisfied with the roaring applause, and hoping the tabs he'd left on a stand in front of Axley were enough to cover his backup needs—it wasn't his fault he'd forgotten the tape!—he kicked off his new spooky single.

> _♫This is Halloween, this is Halloween_
> 
> _Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!♫_

Geez, Lea's backup was _rough_. It probably would've helped to teach him the song in advance, but it wasn't Demyx's fault he couldn't read tabs. Get with the program, bro!

> _♫In this world we're visiting_
> 
> _All the monsters dance and sing_
> 
> _In this world, don't we love it now?_
> 
> _We're only having fun, so don't tell the King♫_

So what if he'd lifted the tune from something he'd heard while visiting Halloweentown and thrown in a couple of sitar solos? The kids enjoyed it, and these guys would never be able to tell! Probably.

He finished the song and made several dramatic bows, and Lea took a bag of candy and threw it into the crowd.

Demyx walked out through the crowd, strumming his sitar throughout, and looked for the silver-haired kid. He was back there hanging out with the King—oops, probably should've changed _that_ lyric! And he most definitely _wasn't_ smiling.

Oh, come on, that song was badass! Spooky! Fun! Clearly Riku lacked taste.

Demyx stuck his palms against his cheeks and stuck his tongue out, trying his level best to say "loser!"

And then... Riku laughed, and a faint smile stuck on his face... kinda looked like he was staring off into space, but still. He'd done it! What an achievement! And it hadn't even taken that much work.

Demyx was pretty sure he'd never seen that kid smile before.

Well, Demyx hadn't seen much of him before in general. And he had only _just_ met Riku before he'd been flung into the throes of grief. Man, that's heavy. Rough times for a young soul.

He made a mental note to add "lyrics collab w/ Riku" to his to-do list later—thought it'd be a bit of a bummer to bring it up now.

"Hey, kid!" Demyx called instead.

"Me?"

Demyx nodded and winked. "Chill out every once in a while, OK?"

Riku couldn't seem to pick an expression, much like when Demyx had first met him. "I-I'll think about it."

Demyx gave him a vigorous rub on the shoulder, and Riku shivered and stepped back.

See? He knew that kid was _stiff._ Demyx had no idea how a kid from an island didn't know how to take a freaking break.

He met up with Naminé, who'd taken the shy kid route of hanging out in the back the whole time, and who had a big smile on her face. "Saw you got him to smile a bit!"

"You can count on me!"

"Now let's get outta here! I'm sick of this place," Lea insisted.

"Well, Naminé, I think I've learned a lesson here," Demyx said, summoning a Corridor of Darkness.

Naminé placed a finger on her chin. "Mmm... just be yourself and share your talents with those in need?"

"Nope!" Demyx turned back, beaming. "Work is spooky. Never, ever, try hard at anything."

**Author's Note:**

> The idea of Demyx throwing a party that nobody attends had been on my mind for a while and I finally got to write it! This was written for the Halloween zine and I'm glad I finally got to share it~
> 
> Thanks to mousapelli for the beta as well!


End file.
